By Dave Bangert
Journal and Courier (Lafayette, IN) | July 23, 1993
When you hear Lisa Germano play and sing, don’t expect the buoyant granger pop and populism her fiddle supplied for fellow Hoosier boss John Mellencamp.
Germano joined Mellencamp during his Scarecrow tour in 1986, was a big part of two of his records and even tossed a couple of her own earthy tunes on the soundtrack of his film, Falling From Grace. She still tours with Indiana’s favorite rock ‘n’ roll son.
But where Mellencamp fills his tales of social ills with sexual swagger and Rolling Stones riffs, Germano’s major label debut, Happiness, is a search through her own confusion delivered in diminutive, bohemian tones.
Germano pokes herself in slender ribs, constantly trying to make herself understand that happiness is right around the corner if she’d only look for it.
Even with self-esteem tenuous at best and gloom and despair more often around that corner, Happiness is so alluring, all the same.
The 13-song record—in stores Tuesday—is a follow-up to On the Way Down from Moon Palace, which the Mishawaka native released on her own dur-1ng a 1991 tour break. That record was fantastic with its music box beauty and fairly innocent charm.
Happiness, though, is as dark as it is spirited. Germano shelves charm here in favor of abounding self-deprecation and often caustic nervous energy.
Recorded in New Orleans at the studio-home of Daniel Lanois—best known for his production work with U2—Happiness is produced by Malcolm Burn
Burn has worked with a strong, ethereal lot, including moody guitar hero Chris Whitley and New Orleans’ favorite sons, the Neville Brothers. Here, he virtually wraps aural landscapes around Germano’s fiddle, guitar, piano and her sparsely arranged jigs, two-steps, lullabies and rock numbers.
What Germano comes up with is comparable to Marianna Faithful’s classic, Broken English, with the agrarian soul of arty farm musician Robin Holcom.
Only this time, Germano gets after herself with such lines: You wish you were pretty / But you’re not / Ha ha ha, from “Bad Attitude;” You’d always rather feel bad, from “Energy;” and Nobody told me what to do when life gets pretty ugly, from “Around the World.”
Along the way, she find the solace of the enveloping relationship of “You Make Me Wanto Wear Dresses,” and then mixes in solace of another kind in Nancy Sinatra’s hit, “These Boots Were Made for Walking.”
Even when Germano turns things up on “Everbody’s Victim,” the message of self-destiny—Silence isn’t golden—is still plaintive. She drowns it with sporadic bursts of abusive guitar and plunking stee-mine repetition that suggests the struggle over powerless feelings is every bit as tough as she make it out to be.
The funny thing is, by the end of Happiness, the cycle seems complete and more confident than the songs contained here. And Happiness turns into a truly seductive piece.
Featured Image: Lisa Germano makes her major label debut with Happiness. (Photo: Pamela Springsteen)
